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During her time in Hartford, Esty opposed efforts by then-Governor M. Jodi Rell to eliminate the state’s Office of Consumer Counsel in a budget cutting move. The office represents the interests of utility customers in rate cases before Connecticut utility regulators.

“It doesn’t help to solve the (budget) problem; all it does is to distract people from the real budget issues facing the state,” Esty said at the time. “This is all smoke and mirrors.”

Using her position on the Appropriations Committee, Esty helped secure funding for 24 hour staffing at shelters. She also took on her own Democratic Party leaders to demand more accountability the state budgeting process and cut her own pay by 10 percent, returning it to the taxpayers.

Another reason Esty’s supporters like her chances in the race for the Democratic nomination and in November is that they see her as a moderate Democrat.

“I see her almost as being a pro-business Democrat,” said Pugliese, who has worked as a senior vice president at banking giant HSBC and as president of the East Hartford Chamber of Commerce.

When aerospace manufacturer Pratt & Whitney moved to close its Cheshire engine repair plant on Knotter Drive in 2009, Esty was among the political leaders who fought to get workers new job placements within the company or early retirement packages.

She even joined forces with the man who is now her main Democratic rival for the Fifth District Congressional Seat, state House Speaker Chris Donovan. Together with other lawmakers, they urged P&W management to keep negotiating with the state in an effort that ultimately failed.

When the next election cycle for state representatives came up in November 2010, Adinolfi sought a political rematch with Esty.

The race between the two candidates was played out against the background of a capitol felony murder trail of one of the two accused of killing a Cheshire mother and her two daughters in a July 2007 home invasion. As jurors heard testimony about why Steven

Hayes deserved to die for his crimes, Esty clung to a position she had held in the first race against Adinolfi, that she was opposed to the death penalty.